


La Douleur Exquise

by chaotic rainbow (krazybaby21)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alexandre's sort of a scared in-the-closet gay, Gryffindor/Slytherin Inter-House Relationships, M/M, One Shot, Possibly slightly OOC Sirius??? I honestly don't know, Unless people want more that it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-12
Updated: 2017-11-12
Packaged: 2019-02-01 03:27:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12696336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/krazybaby21/pseuds/chaotic%20rainbow
Summary: Alexandre du L'ancre has a problem. A big problem. Like, an entire foot taller than him problem. And that problem is personified in none other than Sirius Black...





	La Douleur Exquise

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [a tumblr post](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/338328) by viria. 



One wouldn’t think that a subject called “History of Magic” would be boring, but it truly was. It was a lazy, warm, Friday afternoon, and given that it was right after lunch, it made for a roomful of very sleepy students. Even Alexandre du L'ancre, a notoriously studious 6th year boy, was finding it hard to keep from dozing off, and had taken to doodling on his parchment and furiously ignoring his seatmate to keep himself awake.

However, it is, as Alexandre was very quickly learning, increasingly hard to ignore an attractive person when they are sitting less than a foot away from you, head on their arms, snoring softly, and drooling all over their half-assed attempt at notes. It was especially hard to ignore them when said person was Sirius Black, Alexandre’s hardcore fancy since 4th year.

It hadn’t always been that way. Once upon a time, Alexandre and Sirius had known each other as children, for the du L'ancre and the Blacks were both respectable Slytherin families, and respectable Slytherin families made it their job to know one another. As children, Alexandre had absolutely loathed Sirius; he was loud, he was brash, and whenever he got that gleam in his eye, Alexandre knew that someone was going to get in trouble. Alexandre had never been able to understand how Sirius could be so blatantly against all of his families ideals, how he could talk so freely of escaping them, as if they were his wardens and Grimmauld Place was his prison. How could he be so disrespectful of his own blood? When the time came for them to both attend Hogwarts, Alexandre wasn’t at all surprised when Sirius was sorted into Gryffindor; he could hardly imagine Sirius fitting in with the collectd, prideful Slytherins that his family expected him to be like.

As a Slytherin himself, Alexandre had at first been grateful for the fact that he’d have minimal interaction with the eldest Black boy. However, as the years had passed, Alexandre found himself grateful for different reasons―and in fourth year, had finally realized why. Something in him had changed, for better or for worse, and the things that Alexandre had once found irritating in Sirius Black now endeared him. It had been easy enough to ignore this little infatuation before, when in even the classes that they shared they completely ignored one another. But earlier that week, Sirius and his best mate James Potter had apparently been too unruly and Professor Binns had declared the two be seperated. Naturally, Alexandre had been the only one with an open seat beside him, and that was where Binns had placed Sirius, as if that were a punishment for the Gryffindor.

And so here they were.

Alexandre propped his cheek up on his fist and focused on the movement of his quill inking a figure eight over and over on the corner of his parchment. He most certainly wasn’t noticing the way that Sirius’s hair curled at the nape of his neck, or the gentle rise and fall of his broad shoulders as he breathed, because noticing those things would mean that Alexandre was looking at Sirius, and he most certainly was _not_ looking. No, he wasn’t paying any attention at all to the slight parting of Sirius’s lips, or the shallow indent in the center of his full lower lip like a godly finger had pressed down lightly into wet clay, because thoughts like that lead him down a bad mental road. First, he’d simply be admiring the perfect curve of Sirius’s cupid’s bow, or the way his dark hair fell over his eyes and brushed against his cheek, and then Alexandre would be wondering what it would feel like to have those lips press against his own, that hair tangled in his fingers, that body pressed against his in a dark corridor―

Quite suddenly, Alexandre realized that he’d been quite obviously staring, his hand stalled on the page. Worst of all, while he’d been spacing out, Sirius had apparently awoken from his little nap, and was now gazing back at him with hazy, half-lidded eyes. A half-smirk had curled his lips, and there was something in his drowsy, mildly complacent expression that said that he knew exactly what Alexandre had just been thinking of.

Alexandre’s pen clattered out of his hand and he ripped his eyes away, forcing himself to instead focus on the parchment in front of him. His absent tracing of the figure eight had left a puddle of ink and a tear in his paper, and he realized with some ire that there was now sapphire ink staining his hand and the cuff of his sleeve. (And it was a new shirt, too! Ugh.) He could feel Sirius’s eyes on the side of his head and ran a hand through his chestnut hair, letting it fall to cover his face. There was no doubt that his face had gone nearly the same shade as the crimson on the Gryffindor uniform, and his heart thudded in his chest, the sound deafeningly loud in his own ears, so loud he feared that Sirius Black could hear it as well.

Wouldn’t that just be a perfect addition to his humiliation, his tell-tale heart proclaiming to the world his feelings? Unlike Mr. Poe’s unnamed protagonist, Alexandre had never taken another life, but was this not worse? If the wrong people were to know―his family, his peers, his “friends”―his life could either be a very short one, or an incredibly tortuous one. To the sort of people that he associated with, blood purity was everything, and anything to dilute a bloodline could be considered traitorous. As the last of the du L'ancre line, it was up to Alexandre to pass on the family name, the family blood. If anyone were to find out that…well, you know.

There was a term that he’d once read in a book― _la douleur exquise._ The literal English translation was “the exquisite pain,” but it meant more than that. It was a term that named that terrible, heart-wrenching feeling when you love someone that you can never be with. Once upon a time, Alexandre had found such a feeling melodramatic―how could looking at someone you love physically hurt your heart? It hadn’t made any sense to him before, but now… Well, now he knew the name of that horrid hollowness in his chest that he felt whenever he looked at Sirius.

When Alexandre finally dared to glance back Sirius, the Gryffindor had seemingly drifted back into dreamland, but Alexandre had the most horrid feeling that this would not be the end.

 

~

 

The moment that class ended, Alexandre gathered his things and bolted from the room as though the hounds of hell were on his heel.

He’d managed to get out just before anyone else and had, for the most part, succeeded in avoiding the Marauders for the rest of the afternoon. (There was an accidental run-in―literally―with that Remus Lupin fellow in the Charms corridor, but after a hurried apology, they hadn’t spoken again.) He didn’t dare confront Sirius for two reasons: A.) he wasn’t entirely certain that Sirius was truly aware of his feelings or if he was simply overreacting (and, given his terrible fear of being discovered and his tendency to not think logically when confronted with something that horrified him so, the latter was incredibly likely); and B.) he wasn’t certain that he could be alone with Sirius, and if they were speaking of a sensitive matter like this, they would most certainly have to talk in private.

The worry that he might accidentally out himself was greater than the one that Sirius knew anything in the first place, because honestly, Sirius wasn’t exactly the sharpest tool in the shed. He probably thought that everyone was in love with him to be perfectly honest. And anyway, the likelihood that Sirius would say anything if he did know was slim; Sirius didn’t have the mind of a Slytherin, and even if he did, would realize that there was nothing he could gain from outing Alexandre to everyone. The only reason that Alexandre could possibly think of that would drive Sirius to do it was spite, and as far as he knew, they were still on fairly civil terms, considering. Lest there was some sort of childhood feud that Alexandre had forgotten about (which Alexandre highly doubted, for he had a very good memory―though, of course, he couldn’t even pretend to know how Sirius’s mind worked, or what would stick with him all these years), he thought that he was fairly safe.

After spending half of his open hour in the library doing little more than trying to distract himself with homework (for the record, no, he was not successful), Alexandre realized that he’d read the same paragraph in his Defense Against the Dark Arts textbook five times in the past ten minutes and hadn’t absorbed a word. With a leavy sigh he shut his book and pushed it away with a dramatic flourish. He couldn’t possibly hope to focus on their current lesson on Grecian vampires with such a turmoil in his mind. The image of Sirius’s sleepy half-smirk, of the mischievous, knowing glint in his dark eyes, had been plaguing Alexandre all day, appearing in his mind at the most inopportune of moments. Even now, it haunted him, twisting his stomach with horrid, wonderful little butterflies. He squirmed in his seat as it flashed before his eyes once more.

“ _Zut alors_ ,” Alexandre murmured to himself, running a hand over his face. “You are a terribly pathetic human being, Alexandre.”

He went on autopilot then, sweeping his things into his bag and standing, shouldering the leather messenger tote with one fluid movement. Perhaps a bit of fresh air would clear his head, would help him to think without those obscene thoughts distracting him. It was a long shot, he knew, but he was willing to try it anyhow; he was willing to try just about anything if it would help him focus.

Humming a desultory tune under his breath, Alexandre swiftly left the library. The corridor he took was quiet and utterly empty, which was entirely the reason that he preferred this one to the main corridor leading to the library. He often enjoyed the silence of a vacant hall, where that could be heard was his own breathing, his footfalls on the flagstones, the beating of his own heart. In a quiet hall, one could hear if another was coming up behind you, and could prepare to be dragged into a hypothetical conversation about the toxicity of faerie blood (long story), or bombarded with a childish Gryffindor prank that turned his hair purple for a month (a shorter story, but a much more irritating one at that.)

It was precisely this solitude that allowed him to be aware that someone was running up on his right (something that should have been impossible, mind you, given that there wasn’t a side corridor where he heard the footsteps coming from―or, well, not one that he knew of anyway) a moment before a hand grabbed his arm and yanked him behind a tapestry and into― _quelle surprise_ ―a secret corridor that he hadn’t been aware existed only moments before.

Instinctively, Alexandre reached for his wand, a hex springing to the tip of his tongue―but it died a moment later when he realized just who it was that was currently pinning him to the wall in a dark, hidden corridor. “Oh, why am I not surprised?” he muttered to himself, rolling his eyes up to the heavens and cursing just whatever god was likely laughing their arse off at his wonderful fortunate.

“Sirius Black. To what do I owe the pleasure?” Alexandre drawled, doing his very best to sound completely disinterested in everything.

He’d been playing this facade for as long as he could remember, which made it easy enough to slide back into it. The only thing different this time was that he’d never before attempted it with someone that made his heart pound and his palms sweat and his mind race the way that Sirius did.

“You are a hard man to track down, du L'ancre, y’know that? Blimey.” Sirius shook his head, dark hair tumbling into his eyes, completely oblivious to the little shivers that shot down Alexandre’s spine upon hearing Sirius pronounce his surname correctly. (Non-French speakers tended to emphasize it incorrectly, a pronunciation that lacked the enchanting factor that the correct one had.)

“Did it ever occur to you that if you couldn’t find me, it was because that I didn’t want to be found?” Alexandre raised a brow. He glanced down at the hand on his shoulder, the one pressing him to the wall, and his nose crinkled in annoyance. “Now, would you be a dear and release me? I’ve just had this shirt pressed, and you’ve gone and wrinkled it. Dreadful manners, you know.”

Sirius’s brow creased, but he obliged. He took a step back as well, and Alexandre released the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. The Slytherin gave him a curt nod, a way of thanking him without showing too much gratitude.

“So,” Alexandre started, making a show of smoothing out the front of his shirt, “you have me in a dark corridor. From the rumors I’ve heard of you, this could either result in some sort of brawl that leaves one or both of us in the hospital wing, or a frantic snogging session―a frankly apathetic one, at that, if what I’ve heard holds any merit. What shall it be, hm?”

For a moment, Alexandre nearly broke character, startled by the words coming out of his own mouth. Had he honestly just suggested that Sirius Black had dragged him here for to _snog_ , knowing the circumstances, knowing his own greatest concern _actuellement_? Had he actually gone mad? But then he remembered who he was with, and the crack in his facade was swiftly sealed, hopefully unnoticeable in the dimness of the hall.

Even Sirius seemed stunned―the last time they’d held what could truly be classified as a conversation, Alexandre’s wit had not yet been sharpened as fine as it was now. But then Sirius grinned, teeth even more brilliant than the white of his crumpled uniform shirt. The top two buttons of his shirt were undone, showing off the pale column of his throat, the sharpe line of his collarbone. Alexandre forced himself to look back at Sirius’s face, knowing that it wouldn’t do to be caught staring at the Gryffindor by the Gryffindor twice in one afternoon. “Those Slytherins really have changed you, haven’t they? Made you more of a smartass, amazingly.”

“Made me more keen to show it, actually.”

Sirius chuckled. “Precisely my point.”

“What exactly _is_ your point, Black?” Alexandre inquired―demanded, more like. “That little thing in class, now you drag me into a dark hallway, and for what?”

“What little thing in class?” Sirius tilted his head then, not unlike a curious puppy. It was kind of adorable, actually, which was a strange thought; looking at tall, lean, Sirius, who was all dark eyes, gorgeous hair, and cheekbones sharp enough to kill, adorable wasn’t often an adjective that came to mind. Illecebrous, yes. Selcouth, perhaps. Utterly unendurable, _hell_ yes. But adorable? Not really, no. It is somewhat hard to find someone a whole foot taller than you adorable, especially when one had a face like that.

“The―you know, that blasted look of yours,” Alexandre replied with a scowl. “That one that says that you know all my darkest secrets and you aren’t afraid to hold them over my head for however long you see fit. It’s frankly a very Slytherin look, which I suppose must just be in your blood or something because anyone with eyes and ears can see that you, Sirius Black, are quite possibly the farthest thing from a proper Slytherin despite your bloodline that I’ve ever had the discourtesy to meet.”

“...I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“I―ugh!” Alexandre threw his hands up. “You are utterly _insufferable_ , you know that?”

Sirius flashed a dashing grin. “Oh, you don’t think that.”

“Don’t I?”

The Gryffindor shook his head. “I know you, du L'ancre. I know what makes you tick. If you really thought that, you’d have walked away by now, wouldn’t you?”

Alexandre opened his mouth to protest, then closed it, knowing that Sirius was right. “You never answered my question, Black,” he said quietly. His tone was lethal, and when he raised his baby-blues to met Sirius’s eyes, there was such a freezing note in his them that the Gryffindor actually took a step back. “I’m only staying to find out what it is you want, nothing more. If you’ve brought me here to waste my time, I assure that my earlier comment on one of us ending up in the hospital wing will become a promise.”

And, just like that, Sirius’s complacent look vanished. “You already know what this is about, don’t you?” It wasn’t really a question. “I’m not an idiot, du L'ancre.”

“Oh, well that’s debatable.” Alexandre sighed. “What are you claiming to be knowledgeable on now? Graeco-Roman cuisine? Ancient Mesopotamian literature? The contents of the secret vault at the _Louvre,_ perhaps?”

Sirius ignored him. “I’m not blind, either. I’ve seen the way you look at me when you think I can’t see you. Like your heart’s being ripped in two.”

It sounded suspiciously like he was quoting someone or something; it didn’t sound at all like something Sirius would actually say. There was a flatness to the words, like he was repeating something that had been told to him and he hadn’t particularly enjoyed hearing. Alexandre’s guard instantly reinforced itself.

“Once again, I don’t have all day. What precisely is your point?”

Sirius took a step forward. In the narrow hall, this brought him far closer to Alexandre than the Slytherin was comfortable with. They were practically chest-to chest when Sirius spoke, words soft but dark eyes intense. “My _point_ , Alexandre du L'ancre, is that I think I can tell when someone is in love with me.”

Alexandre’s bag thudded to the ground.

“You think that everyone is in love with you,” Alexandre shot back, making no move to pick it up. He had to tilt his head up to meet Sirius’s gaze, which made him feel decidedly less intimidating than he usually liked to think he was and more like a cornered mouse in the claws of a cat. “What makes you think that I’m any different from your usual fantasies?”

“Alright, then,” Sirius conceded. “Tell me I’m wrong. Tell me that you have no feelings for me whatsoever.”

“Well, I have plenty of feelings about you,” Alexandre huffed. “Ire, frustration, the excessive desire to smack you every time you open your mouth―that’s a strong one, too―”

“You’re stalling.”

Alexandre froze. “What?”

“It’s as easy as six words, du L'ancre― _I’m not in love with you.”_ Sirius’s eyes glittered. “For someone so adamant to prove me wrong, you sure are taking your time doing it, aren’t you? One would almost think that I’m actually right.”

And suddenly, he was leaning down, one hand braced against the stone wall over Alexandre’s head, the other curling under Alexandre’s chin to tip his head up. The breath caught in Alexandre’s throat. “Wh-what are you doing?” the Slytherin whispered.

“Stop me,” Sirius murmured, his lips brushing over Alexandre’s. Alexandre would have expected them to be horribly chapped, given that he knew for a fact that Sirius often spent the free period they were given out on the Quidditch pitch with James―but then again, Sirius said that he’d been looking for Alexandre for a while, which meant that he very well could have not been flying today. They were balmy too, unsurprisingly―Sirius was notorious for his vast collection of lip balms for precisely the aforementioned reason.

Alexandre’s eyes fell closed and he let out a shuddering breath. He should have been pushing Sirius away, but something in him stilled his hand. He discovered that when his hands found Sirius’s shoulders, he was foolishly pulling the Gryffindor closer instead of shoving him away.

He felt Sirius’s smirk against his mouth a moment before he crushed their mouth together, his fingers winding in Alexandre’s hair. A soft gasp escaped Alexandre as he kissed back, arms twining up around Sirius’s neck, partially to pull the Gryffindor closer and partially to hold himself up, for Alexandre found that his knees had gone weak.

Alexandre was dreaming, he had to be. He must have dozed off in the library without realizing it, because there was no way on God’s green earth that Sirius Black was kissing him.

But in that moment, he couldn’t find it in him to care.

He returned the kiss in full, suddenly not caring if he would wake in moments and find that it was in fact a dream, or if he would learn that this was truly happening. He didn’t care if  it got out now―if his parents disowned him, or worse, at least it would have been worth it.

Sirius’s hair, dark and fine, tickled the sensitive skin of Alexandre’s wrists and hands as he tangled his fingers in it. It was just as soft as it looked.

He tasted like lip balm and breath mints.

Too soon, Sirius pulled away. He pressed his forehead to Alexandre’s and let their eyes meet. Alexandre had heard of opia, that mysterious, intense feeling one could experience when locking eyes with another, but he had never experienced it himself before now. It felt like...well, sort of like legilimency―the same sort of mild invasive feeling, like suddenly your every thought was on display―but not as horrid. And it was mutual; Alexandre felt that he could read Sirius just as well as Sirius could him.

In the shadows of the corridor, it was hard to see Sirius’s face, but Alexandre could picture it well enough in his mind. Flushed cheeks, bright eyes, mussed hair. He vaguely wondered what he looked like then, in Sirius’s eyes―a blushing mess? A desperate, sick thing who took pleasure in kissing other men? Oh, what could he possibly think of his childhood acquaintance now?

“Did… Is this real?” Alexandre asked.

“Do you want it to be?” Sirius gently cupped Alexandre’s cheek, thumb rubbing circles into the other’s skin.

“I… don’t know,” the Slytherin admitted, voice barely above a whisper.

Sirius opened his mouth to answer, but before he could, the sound of a pair of giggling girls strolling down the hallway beyond the tapestry reached their ears. Slytherin and Gryffindor sprang apart instinctively, Sirius jumping so far that he nearly slammed into the other wall. They stared at the tapestry, holding their breaths, until the girls’ chattering faded as they apparently turned the corridor. Sirius heaved a relieved sigh and turned to face the other boy once more, only to discover that Alexandre had vanished; the tapestry fell shut behind him with a thwack, his footsteps definitely sounding more like running than walking as he fled the scene. Upon realizing that he’d likely scared the Slytherin off, Sirius slumped against the wall and raked a hand through his hair.

“Moony was right…” he muttered to the flagstones at his feet. “I’m a bloody idiot.”

 

~

 

Alexandre didn’t show up to his next two classes. In the Great Hall at dinnertime, he pointedly didn’t look at the Gryffindor table, ignoring the set of dark eyes boring into the side of his head from across the room. It may have been rude to snog someone and then promptly pretend that they didn’t exist―he’d heard many fifth-year girls complain about boys who did just that―but propriety be damned. If he allowed himself to think about what had transpired, he would go mad―if he wasn’t mad already, that was. He still wasn’t entirely certain that what had happened hadn’t simply been a figment of his imagination, a horrid tortuous hallucination caused by lack of sleep and frayed nerves.

He was only half surprised when an arm caught his elbow as he left the Great Hall and pulled him into an alcove, hidden from view of the main corridor by a rather ghastly gargoyle statue. “This is getting a bit tiresome, Black,” Alexandre said with a fake yawn. “If you want to talk to me, why don’t you do it in public like a normal person instead of dragging me into a dark hidey-hole?”

Sirius raised a brow. “So, next time I talk to you about how you’re in love with me, I should do it in front of everyone in the Great Hall, then?” When Alexandre didn’t answer, Sirius smirked. “That’s what I thought.”

“Are you here to toy with my feelings again?” Alexandre scowled. “If so, I’ve had quite enough of that for one day, so you’re free to leave.”

“Who says that I was toying with your feelings?”

Alexandre looked for the sarcasm in the words, and, miraculously, found none. “You had to have been messing with me. You can’t seriously think that I would ever believe that you actually wanted to kiss me.”

The Gryffindor grinned, and Alexandre realized his mistake. “Hey, Sirius is―”

“Don’t you dare.”

“Sorry.” Sirius chuckled.

Frustration rose up in Alexandre then, boiling hot. “This is a game to you, isn’t it? You just love to take advantage of someone’s feelings for you and watch them fall apart when they realize just how terrible a person you are? Well, I’m not having it.” His wand was in his hand in moments, the point jammed against the hollow of Sirius’s throat. “You breathe a word of this to anyone, and I swear―

Sirius’s hand closed around Alexandre’s wrist, pointing the wand away from his throat and drawing Alexandre closer. “You have me all wrong, du L'ancre,” the Gryffindor murmured against Alexandre’s ear. A traitorous frisson shot down the Slytherin’s spine. “This isn’t exactly fun for me either, you know―fancying someone who’s the epitome of the life you never want to have.”

Alexandre tensed. “You’re lying.”

“Am I?” Sirius’s gaze dragged down to Alexandre’s lips. He pressed their mouths together, just for a moment; a ghost of a kiss, a sip of nectar, a tiny breath of the air that Alexandre needed to keep from drowning. Then he pulled away. “You don’t need to worry about me telling anyone, Alexandre,” he whispered. “I want to keep you to myself.”

When he released Alexandre a moment later and left, Alexandre found that the only thing holding him upright anymore was that hideous gargoyle. His heart was running a marathon in his chest, and his throat felt tight, but for one tiny, foolish little moment, there was hope for him.

And suddenly, Alexandre couldn’t stop smiling.

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Shamelessly inspired by this tumblr post: 
> 
> https://i.pinimg.com/originals/c9/f3/a5/c9f3a521ce10c264691c3c1a394a79a2.jpg
> 
> I got bored and was surfing Pinterest and I came across that picture, and was suddenly gripped with the desire to fanfiction. And thus this was born.


End file.
